Room prices continue to peak, the rest of the market is slowing down

Skimmed milk concentrate was also 4,7% higher at DCA at €2890 per tonne of dry matter. The protein-rich liquid product therefore remains priced considerably lower than butter at €5365 per tonne and cream at €7145 per tonne.

Because almost all milk fat is diverted to the cream market, very little is left for butter. Little of this is made or traded. That is why the butter quotation seems largely virtual lately. There is little volume underneath. Due to the tight availability, there will be very little of the usual purchasing and storing of butter for the Christmas season this year.

Aldi pays the price of butter in cream equivalent
Supermarkets also have to do their best to be able to achieve some volume. Aldi reportedly already had to pay the butter price in cream equivalent for a contract with delivery in November. An amount of €5888 per tonne is mentioned (but in small packaging). For another contract with a term of three months, a price was reportedly paid between €5500 and €5600 per kilo, which is also well above the current butter quotation.

Gouda more expensive than Cheddar
Cheese prices are actually barely rising this week. The quotations for Gouda and Edam cheeses remain around €4000 to €4060 per tonne. It is remarkable that Gouda foil cheese is suddenly more expensive than Cheddar, which contains a higher percentage of dry matter. Mozzarella cheese rose the most in price this week and is now trading at €3620 per tonne. 

Cheese traders are noticing increasing resistance to the current high prices. They fear overheating. A number of industrial processors are combating the high costs by limiting the amount of cheese in their products. This can be done quite easily to a certain extent, because pizzas, for example, do not require a weight statement for the ingredients used.

Skimmed milk powder exceeds the €3000 limit
For powders, the price of skimmed milk powder has clearly exceeded the €3000 per tonne mark, for both food and feed. Whey powder has a price of €1100 per tonne and whole milk powder exceeds €3600 per tonne. Prices for all these products have risen slightly more strongly in the past week than for cheese, but the rate of price increase is also decreasing here.

Price falls were seen on the spot market for the first time in a long time. There was a decline in particular in the Netherlands, but the effect was smaller in Northern Germany. However, the declines occur in a very 'thin' market, with limited trade and small batches of product changing hands. A trend cannot really be distilled from this.

In the meantime, the milk supply remains quite tight in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany as well as in France. In the latter country, the spot milk price therefore remains quite high. According to traders, up to 55 cents per liter of milk is paid.